TransCanada Corporation’s joint venture with IEnova, Infraestructura Marina del Golfo (IMG), has been chosen to build, own and operate the $2.1 billion Sur de Texas-Tuxpan natural gas pipeline in Mexico.

Sur de Texas – Tuxpan (Marino) gas pipeline will transport natural gas from an underwater route in the Gulf of Mexico, from the South of Texas, USA to Tuxpan, Veracruz.

The project will be supported by a 25-year natural gas transportation service contract for 2.6 billion cubic feet a day with the Comisión Federal de Electricidad (CFE), Mexico’s state-owned power company. According to CFE, the pipeline will have a length of 800 km and a 42-inch diameter.

“We are extremely pleased to further our growth plans in Mexico with one of the most important natural gas infrastructure projects for that country’s future,” said Russ Girling, TransCanada’s president and chief executive officer.

“This new project brings our footprint of existing assets and projects in development in Mexico to more than US$5 billion, all underpinned by 25-year agreements with Mexico’s state power company.”

The bid for the Sur de Texas-Tuxpan project was presented in partnership with IEnova, a subsidiary of Sempra Energy. TransCanada will develop, operate and own 60 per cent of this project, with IEnova owning 40 per cent of it.

TransCanada expects to invest approximately $1.3 billion in the partnership to construct the pipeline and anticipates an in-service date of late 2018. The pipeline will begin offshore in the Gulf of Mexico, at the border point near Brownsville, Texas and end in Tuxpan, in the state of Veracruz.

In addition to a connection with CENAGAS’s pipeline system in Altamira, the project will interconnect with TransCanada’s Tamazunchale and Tuxpan-Tula pipelines as well as with other transporters in the region.